Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena

Welcome to the working group Gauge/Gravity duality

Within Theoretical Physics, over recent years new links between Quantum Gravity theories and ordinary Quantum Field theories were discovered which are referred to as gauge/gravity (or holographic) dualities. The essential feature of such gauge/gravity dualities is to provide relations between branches of theoretical physics which appear to be distinct at first sight. In particular, holographic dualities relate quantum field theories on Minkowski spacetime to quantum gravity or string theories in higher dimensional spacetimes.

Holographic dualities may be used in a two-fold way: Holographic dualities provide a non-perturbative definition of quantum gravity theories in asymptotically anti-de Sitter (AdS) spacetimes in terms of unitary quantum field theories on the conformal boundary of AdS. In particular, these dualities allow us to recast profound quantum gravitational questions, such as the fate of evaporating black holes and the information they contain, into a more tractable field theoretic language, and answer them there.

Moreover, by solving gravitational theories in the semi-classical, weakly curved limit arising from string theory or supergravity, we may investigate strongly coupled field theories. In particular, these dualities provide a new tool for determining the phase diagram and describing dynamical processes in strongly coupled quantum field theories, for which a description by conventional means is often difficult or even impossible.

PhD Students

Textbook

Martin Ammon, together with Johanna Erdmenger (University of Würzburg), wrote the first textbook on the renowned AdS/CFT correspondence, as well as its generalizations known as gauge/gravity dualities. This was the first textbook in this important research topic covering the foundations as well as the applications of gauge/gravity duality. The textbook is published by Cambridge University Press.

Publications of the group

Here you find material for the lectures given by Prof. Martin Ammon.

Particles and Fields (winter term 2018)

The lecture will be given in English. All important information is summarized here.